Roberto Lugo - Plate

2.125 in x 13.375 in

For fans of nationally renowned, Philly-based artist Roberto Lugo, this ceramic plate is an excellent example of the artist's early work.

Made in the 2010s while the artist was still in school, this piece is a classic example of Lugo's intervention into the history of ceramics. The plate itself was manufactured by the Victoria Porcelain Factory sometime between 1891 - 1918. Lugo not only signed the work, inscribing his name on top of the manufacturer's stamp in a bold claim of authorship, but added a self-portrait of himself in a crown in the center. The portrait is surrounded by graffiti linework - arrows that guide the eye around the surface, rushing past letters and dynamic shapes that work both with and against the pattern of the dish.

A fusion of old and new, this piece represents an unlikely collaboration between one of the most notable ceramicists in the United States today and the largest porcelain factory in the late nineteenth century. This is a perfect example of Lugo's reimagining of traditional ceramics with a 21st-century street sensibility.

A frequent exhibitor and longtime friend of the organization, Roberto Lugo was a Guest Artist-in-Residence at The Clay Studio in the summer of 2016. Lugo is an American artist, ceramist, social activist, spoken word poet, and educator. He uses porcelain as his medium of choice, illuminating its aristocratic surface with imagery of poverty, inequality, and social and racial injustice. Lugo's works are multicultural mash-ups: traditional European and Asian porcelain forms and techniques reimagined with a 21st-century street sensibility. Their hand-painted surfaces feature classic decorative patterns and motifs combined with elements of modern graffiti and portraits of individuals whose faces are historically absent on this type of luxury item-people like Sojourner Truth, Dr. Cornel West, and the Notorious BIG, as well as Lugo's family members and, very often, himself. Lugo holds a BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute and an MFA from Penn State. He is the recipient of several awards, including a 2019 Pew Fellowship, a Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon Polsky Rome Prize, and a US Artist Award. His work has been featured in exhibitions and in the permanent collections of major museums such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art,the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, among others, and belongs in numerous institutional collections.

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